Singapore Tourism Board strikes deals with Traveloka, Alibaba

The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) has struck partnerships with two major players in online travel – Indonesian unicorn startup Traveloka, fresh out of a US$420 million funding round led by Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC, and China’s Alibaba Group.

Both agreements cover marketing, content and consumer analytics.

With Traveloka, STB announced a Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) to promote the city as a preferred destination for visitors from across South-east Asia, targeting five major South-east Asian markets – Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.

Keith Tan: more partnerships between STB and major OTAs as travel research and transactions shift online

The MoC, which was signed on the sidelines of the Tourism Industry Conference today, will cover three broad areas: information sharing, marketing campaigns and content generation.

Under the MoC, STB and Traveloka will launch at least 12 marketing campaigns across South-east Asia, and increase the volume of Singapore attractions and activities on Traveloka’s online platforms by 15 per cent. In addition, STB will provide content about Singapore to Traveloka from its Tourism Information and Services Hub.

This cross-sharing of knowledge is expected to generate new insights that will enable both entities to target South-east Asian travellers with more relevant offerings.

“As more travel research and transactions shift online, STB will forge new partnerships with major OTAs to better meet the expectations of visitors,” he added.

Yady Guitana, head of global partnership, Traveloka, said: “The online travel market has been increasing exponentially in recent years. We are excited for this partnership as Singapore is one of the top outbound destinations from all of the South-east Asian markets that Traveloka has a strong presence in.”

Prior to this MoC, STB and Traveloka previously collaborated on a campaign in February 2019 to promote Singapore activities and attractions in Indonesia.

Meanwhile, reports say the Indonesian Stock Exchange (IDX) is discussing an IPO with Traveloka. If this goes through, the OTA will be the first startup to go public locally.

STB on the same day also signed a three-year MoU with Alibaba Group to drive visitor arrivals and spending. Similar to scope of the MOU includes co-developing joint marketing campaigns and content, collaborating on inbound Chinese travellers analytics and insights and creating more “smart tourism experiences”.

Over the next three years, STB will work with key business units in the Alibaba ecosystem, such as Alipay, Fliggy, Youku, Damai and Alibaba Cloud, to engage Chinese visitors throughout the consumer journey and gain deeper insights into their travelling behaviour.